I, malfunct, am known outside the internet as Scott Wendt. I am a software engineer and a life long gamer. I started watching charity gaming marathons in 2009 when I caught wind of Mario Marathon. Over the years I have watched numerous other charity marathons and have always wanted to do one of my own. Early in 2012 I decided to do something about it.
Earlier in the year I saw Nathan Fillion tweet that he wanted to give his birthday to charity by requesting that anyone wanting to give him a birthday present instead donate to a charity he wanted to promote instead. I thought that was a reasonably good idea but felt like someone who has what he needs should give a more tangible part of his birthday. For this reason I am giving all of the time of my birthday to entertain you the viewers by playing 24 hours of minecraft on the Xbox 360 while promoting my favorite charity, Child's Play. If you want to give me a birthday present, or you just love Child's Play, please donate using the chipin widget shown above.
From July 5 from 00:00:00 until 24:59:59, my team members and I will play minecraft and encourage our audience to kindly donate to Child's Play charity. There will be audience participation, some prizes, and much fun.
The most important thing you as an audience member can do is watch the marathon and have fun. Then, when you are having all of this fun, tell all of your friends, relatives, aquaintences and even strangers you meet on the street about the marathon and encourage them to come watch. If you are able, make a donation to Child's Play charity. There will be ways for you the audience member to join the game live on stream and also a way for you to join the rest of the audience in a community minecraft experience which will be explained as the event gets closer. There will also be opportunities to win prizes during marathon! So tell all of your friends to show up and together we will have a great time!
A PC minecraft server will be set up for all of the viewers who have donated at least $5 at mc.gamermarathon.net. Leave your minecraft account name in your chipin comment so we can add you to the server list.
Yes, prizes! There will be raffles held throughout the marathon for Minecraft codes, awesome hand stiched pillowcases and a Minecraft lego set. There is also a grand prize raffle for an Xbox 360 Halo 3 edition and Minecraft for Xbox. Entries into the raffle will be earned by donating and sharing the event info with your friends via twitter or facebook. Each $10 will get you an entry into the raffle with a maximum of 6 entries per person. There will also be bonus entries earned for sharing links to the marathon via facebook and twitter for a maximum of 3 bonus entries. Due to issues I've had with shipping and recieving from other countries I am limiting shipping to US and Canada. I am truely sorry to my international friends.
Pictures of prizes will be posted here: http://malfunct.smugmug.com/Video-Games/Penny-Arcade-Xbox
In the words of the charity itself, Child's Play is "a game industry charity dedicated to improving the lives of children with toys and games in our network of over 70 hospitals worldwide." They work in two ways. First by working with hospital staff they set up wish lists full of video games, toys, books, and other fun stuff which kind people may find and fill by sending in a wished for gift. They also recieve cash donations throughout the year which they use to purchase new consoles, peripherals, games and more for hospitals and therapy facilities. These gifts allow children to enjoy wonderful fun during an otherwise generally unpleasant experience in their lives.
I enthusiastically support the Child's Play charity as a way to show, along with all of the other supporters of the charity, that contrary to sometimes popular belief gamers can do good in the world. I also believe that games themselves are a force for good in the world. A great way to demonstrate the positive value of games is use them to make children's lives happier when they are having what is likely a frightening and painful time in thier lives. I also love the community that has formed around this charity, especially the teams that put on thier own game marathons or the audiences that regularily watch them. Finally I think that the administration of the Child's Play charity is top notch. They maintain a very low overhead so that the maximal amount of our donations goes directly toward providing benefits to the children in need.
While I'd like to think I am a trustworthy guy and would follow through on my promise to donate the money to Child's Play, trust is unecessary. When you click the chipin button you are taken directly to the paypal portal for donating directly to Child's Play charity. As this is a direct donation to the charity there is no possible way for me to access the funds and you can be completely secure in knowing your support will be used for all of the wonderful goals of the charity.